i^-TflaRICULTUBF 
ROCHESTER, N. Y.-FOR THE WEEK ENDING SATURDAY, AUGUST 18,1866 
ESTABLISHED IN 1S50 
RENOVATING WORN OUT COTTON FIELDS, 
SALT OR NO SALT? 
MOORE’S RURAL NEW-YORKER, 
AJ! ORIGINAL WEEKLY 
RURAL, LITERARY AND FA MILY NEWSPAPER, 
CONDUCTED BY D. D. T. MOORE, 
With a Corps of Able Assistants and Contributors, 
Mr. R. E. Jamison, ■writing ns from Kingston, 
North Carolina, says: — “I am engaged in the 
cotton culture, and would like to be informed 
through your columns of the best method to 
renovate an old field of light, sandy soil. It Is 
worn out.” 
Doubtless there are many throughout the 
South who are searching after like Information. 
One of the results of the war is to break up, we 
hope, a method of cultivation, which. If per¬ 
sisted in for a century longer, would have turned 
the Cotton States into a desert. How was it 
possible for an Agricultural People to cultivate 
so vast a territory, growing and exporting 
mainly a solitary staple that made no manure, 
and buying large quantities of food, to help 
exhausting the most fertile soil the sun ever 
shone upon? A land must feed flocks and 
herds; its farmers must rotate their crops, and 
practice a mixed husbandry, or its agriculture 
will Inevitably sink into insignificance,— and 
with it the wealth and power of the people and 
nation generally. 
Of one thing we are pretty certain, that, as it 
took years of reckless culture to exhaust the 
cotton fields, so it will take a long course of 
skillful husbandry to renew them. They can¬ 
not he brought up to a fair standard of fer¬ 
tility in a year by any means generally within 
reach of the farmers. But the object which 
the renovator of an exhausted soil must have 
steadily in view, is the restoration of those 
elements of fertility which continual crop¬ 
ping has removed. If the soil will not grow 
cotton or corn, it may, to some extent, peas, 
clover,! buckwheat, or some coarse, strong- 
rooted plant which sends its roots deep into the 
subsoil, and which may be plowed under for a 
green manure. Here, with the aid of a top- 
dressing of guano, bone dust, plaster, or ashes, 
it vui y be laid down to grass and pastured for a 
while, until a turf forms, at which time the field 
may be considered as fairly started on Ub course 
towards usefulness. In some instances circum¬ 
stances will point out a shorter way. Perhaps 
there is a richer subsoil underlying the surface, 
and deep plowing will commingle the soil and 
enrich it, or if, sb in the case our correspondent 
states, the surface soil is sandy, it may be prac¬ 
ticable to give it a dressing of clay or marl, 
which, with a green crop plowed under followed 
by laying down to pasture, would work very 
beneficial changes. In some instances a rich 
muck may be procured for the sand, and in 
others it will doubtless pay to purchase manure, 
but the main reliance of the mass of cultivators 
must be on green-manuring, deep plowing and 
the keeping of more stock. 
The “American Institute Club” recently had 
the question of salt for stock under considera¬ 
tion. Some deemed it a waste of the raw mate¬ 
rial to feed salt to cattle—deeming it not only un¬ 
necessary, but. positively injurious to them. 
Others regarded it as essentia] to the health and 
comfort of both man and beast — the later con¬ 
clusion appearing to be the predominating one. 
Perhaps the readiest way of disposing of the 
question would be to let the cattle have a voice 
or a tongue in the matter. Offer them salt, du¬ 
ring the warm weather of summer, and if they 
refuse it, the conclusion will be fair that it is not 
essential or desirable: if they take it with alac¬ 
rity, then it is legitimate to assume that it is 
good for them, and they know it. 
Iu years gone by it was customary, in the wood¬ 
ed sect ions of the West, to turn out the stock por¬ 
tions of a farmer’s herd in the spring to seek 
their living in the forest and along the creek 
glades. Once a week, or thereabouts, they were 
hunted up and driven home and there treated to 
a feed of salt upon the turl' by the road-side, 
when they were dismissed again to their sylvan 
rambles. They learned, frqrn this, wheresalt was 
to be obtained, and would come for it at regular 
intervals during the Beasou. Now if it was not 
essential to them, would they have taken the 
trouble to come from the woods to get it with 
clock-like regularity ? We think not, and hence 
vote aye on the salt question. 
Again: If salt i» unnecessary, why I 3 it that 
the “salt-licks” of the West are poached up 
like a burn-yard in spring, by the deer fiocklng 
to them during the warm weather ? They go 
there to imbibe the saline water which oozes 
from the base of some cliff overlooking a creek. 
If it was simply water that was sought for it would 
be obtained from the cool running stream and 
not from the scanty pool environed by mud. 
It. was salt that was required and hence the re¬ 
sort to the “licks” daily dnrlDg the prevalence 
of warm dry seasons. For these reasons we think 
it 6 afc to conclude that salt is good for stock— 
essential to their comfort, and should be sup¬ 
plied to them as inclination prompts them to 
partake of it. 
HENRY S. RANDALL, LL, D., 
Editor of the Department of Sheep Husbandry, 
HON. T. C. PETERS, 
Late Pres’t N. Y. State Ag. Soc’y, Southern Cor. Editor. 
EWFoit Terms and other particulars see last page 
WHAT STOCK MOST ENRICHES PASTURE? 
It is generally accepted as a fact that soil 
under pasture grows fertile. When land is 
plowed and cropped, and pasture forms part of 
a systematic rotation, the soil under grass recu¬ 
perates in power to grow grain. This is due to 
several causes, prominent among which is the 
thick turf formed and plowed under, thus sup¬ 
plying a quantity of manure for the succeeding 
crop. If a field were left in grass for a long 
time, and all the growth allowed to rot on the 
ground, we see no reason why the soil would 
not increase in fertility so long as this practice 
was continued. But were the grass removed in 
the form of hay each year, and no compensation 
made, no practical farmer would contend that 
the soil grew richer when subjected to such 
treatment for a long time. Land in grass, then, 
becomes rich only in proportion as the growth 
of vegetable matter from it—as roots, stems, 
leaves and seed—is returned for manure. 
Land is enriched by pasturing for the produc¬ 
tion of grains in two ways; the formation of a 
sod to be rotted for manure, and the deposition 
of the solid and liquid excrements of the 6 tOck. 
It is important for the grain farmer to consider 
the kind of stock which, feeding on his pastures, 
will enrich them most. There is, perhaps, not 
much practical difference in the amount of ma¬ 
nure made by various animals on the same pas¬ 
ture ; but the form in which it is deposited, and 
the habits of stock in choosing their resting 
places ought to be well considered. Horses are 
the very worst fertilizers of pasture; they are 
very close feeders, and they delight to graze the 
summits of knolls, and all spots where the her¬ 
bage is short and sweet. On such spots they are 
continually feeding, yet they manure them very 
little. The observer will find their droppings 
mostly in rich hollows, and places where the 
herbage is rank and coarse, showing that the 
soU is already fertile above the average of the 
field. In this respect cattle have not the saipe 
instinct as the horse, and they are neither so 
close nor so dainty feeders, but the objection 
holds against them, as the horse, that their ma¬ 
nure is not scattered sufficiently for the good of 
the land. This is, indeed, the chief objection to 
employing horses or cattle to enrich land by 
pasturing. If the grass is turned into hay and 
fed to them in the yard or stable the manure 
therefrom may all be Eaved and applied judici¬ 
ously. But this course involves much labor. 
In the field every observant farmer knows that 
the droppings of horses and cattle seem to fer¬ 
tilize the soil but little when their bulk is con¬ 
sidered, and the best effects are invariably seen 
not from the solid but from the liquid manures 
that fall on the field. In pasturing cattle and 
horses we conclude that not more than one part 
in a hundred receives any manure, while the 
ninety-nine other parts are impoverished as 
much as though the grass were cut and removed 
in the form of hay. 
Without doubt sheep are the very best stock 
with which to enrich land by pasturing. They 
range over the whole field and refuse hardly 
anything. Their manure is scattered in the 
very best, form it could be applied as a top-dress¬ 
ing. If they frequent the knolls where the grass 
is sweet they also enrich them, and they choose 
for their resting places at night, and therefore 
fertilize, the highest part of the field. If desi¬ 
rable a fiock may, with little trouble, he nightly 
folded on the poorest spots of the field. In hot 
weather they will frequent the shade of trees, 
but from such places the accumulated manure is 
easily scraped up and distributed to other parts. 
And the farmer who is mainly a grain grower 
will find no stock more profitable and conven¬ 
ient for all his purposes than sheep. 
[As many Agricultural Societies are eecuring and 
arranging permanent grounds for their annual and 
other exhibitions, information is sought relative to 
proper buildings, fixtures, etc. To aid those Interest¬ 
ed iu these improvement", we re-pnhlish the accom¬ 
panying description and illustrations of the excellent 
FaJr Grounds and Exhibition Building of the Union 
Ag. Society of Palmyra, N. Y.) 
The grounds are situated within the limits 
oi the village of Palmyra, and comprise 
about nineteen acres, inclosed by a substan¬ 
tial board fence, eight feet high. The main 
entrance is four rods in width, bordered with 
shade trees, and otherwise adorned. The ar¬ 
rangements for entrauce of pedestrians and car- 
riages (with ticket office convenient to both,) 
and also for exit, are admirable. Tho separate 
entrance lor stock, machinery, etc., is very con¬ 
venient,—while the abundant “water privi¬ 
leges” (two wells and a living stream,) should 
not be overlooked among the Items of comfort 
and convenience for man and beast. 
Tho principal exhibition building — Floral 
Hall — is 68 feet long, 60 lcet wide, and two 
stories high, with a spacious gal¬ 
lery extending around the whole p- 
interior. It is finished through- E 
out in a substantial manner, at a x 
cost of over $3,000, (before tte ; ; 11 / , 
war,) and is lighted with gas. | / / 
The building has a fine, command- ~ / 
ing appearance, (as Bhown in our I 
engraving.) For beauty of loca- a 
tion, convenience of arrangement, z 
and adaptation to the purposes for u j ^ 
which it Is Intended, it is proba- >^| 
bly at least equal, if not superior, ] 
to any structure of the kind which 
we have examined in the State — 
the Amphitheater of the Ontario 
County Agricultural Society (here- : 
tofore illustrated and described in the Rural,) 
alone excelling it it cost, extent and con¬ 
venience ; but that is not an ex 'bition build¬ 
ing of the style and class we are describing. 
From the elevated balconies at each end, a fine 
view can be had of the village and surrounding 
country—a panorama which would delight the 
poet, painter and lover of natural scenery, im¬ 
proved by art and industry. [We understand 
that Carlton H. Rogers, Esq., of Palmyra, 
arranged the gouuds, etc., and also designed the 
building.] 
The arrangement and conveniences of the 
Grounds are so well shown in our diagram, and 
its references, that any detailed description Is 
unnecessary. Could the reader have viewed the 
grounds (and their varied contents) during the 
recent Fair of tho Society, as we did, he would 
have concurred with us in pronouncing all most 
complete and commendable. Be that as It may, 
however, we regard the subject of our notice 
worthy of this illustrative description, ,and trust 
its presentation will awaken a spirit of emula¬ 
tion in such matters among Rural readers. 
WEEDING POTATOES WITH SHEEP. 
01 sneep into me potato hems tor the purpose 
of eating down the weeds. The sheep will not 
touch a potato vine; they cannot be starved 
into eating them. This pasturing with sheep is 
very advantageous when the crop I 3 a late 
planted one, so that the hoeing cannot be com¬ 
pleted until after the haying or harvest is finished. 
At this growing season it is the planter’s aim to 
keep down the grass and weeds so that they may 
be covered with dirt by the cultivator and _ 
hoe when these are used. Pasturing with * 
sheep will attain this object. Early planted 
crops, the cultivation of which is com- « 
pleted iu the first half of summer, fre- | 
quently become grassy and weedy before 
the time of digging—when the size of the 
tops precludes cultivation. In this stage = 
the sheep are economical weeders. It is 
hardly necessary lo mention that the food 
thus given to the sheep makes a double 
profit, inasmuch as It costs absolutely 
nothing while labor is saved and weeds 
prevented from seeding in the crop. 
CASTOR OIL BEAN—ITS CULTIVATION, 
most extensively m Illinois, where, in some 
counties, much attention is paid to it, and ap¬ 
parently much profit thereby derived. A small 
gray bean distinguishes the variety most culti¬ 
vated. The large red, or West India bean, as it 
is called, will yield more oil per bushel, but its 
•yield per acre does not make it as profitable to 
grow as the gray variety. 
The Castor bean should be planted in May as 
soon as the ground becomes sufficiently warn. 
When once started it is a vigorous grower, at¬ 
taining a height of five or six feet, and having 
a strong stalk aud broad, hand-shaped leaves. 
The plant is very tropical in its appearance. In 
a forward season the first pods are ready to cut 
in August, and from that time until frost the 
plants furnish a succession of flowers and ripe 
pods. The field must be gone over often and 
the ripe beans harvested, otherwise the pods fly 
open, the beans fall to the ground and arc wast¬ 
ed. Ten or twelve bushels 
Fall Timotht Grass.—A whiter in the 4 
N. Y, Times, says he saw large meadows of 
timothy grass (Pfdeum Prat (nit,) in Steuben 
county, N. Y., that was four feet high all ■ * 
over the field, yielding three tons of supe¬ 
rior hay per acre. That was, indeed, heavy 
grass, and speaks well for the management 
of the proprietor, as timothy wili not 
attain such great height, where the soil is 
in a poor state of fertility. On the farm 
of Isaac Bower, North Chili, in Western -—.-,— 
New York, in his meadow where there were £ 
numerous bunches of tall timothy, the pres- 
net summer 'we measured one bunch that *-*-- 
was five leet one and a hall mche6 in height , „ 
having heads proportionally long and large. 1), Rear Piazza, 60x10. vim balcony above. 
It wiU pay to manure laud for grass, as & Front Piazza, S8xl0,with balcony abov< 
„ . ' . . . , ’ U, 1>, btaire to gallery, 
well as for raising crops ot cereal grain, E, Business office, and Com. Room, 10x10. 
On most of our meadows three tons of Ladies’Room. . 
, , ... , , The posts surrounding A support the gal- 
superior hay might as well be raised as only lery, which extends mound the hall, and ie 
one and a half, if the soil were properly 16 J? et wlde v , 
, , . ’ , . 1 l J There are three large doors at each end oi 
cultivated and manured. the hall. 
are stated to be an 
average crop, though from fifteen to twenty-five 
are sometimes grown. Much depends on the 
season; the first frost ruins the plants. Hence 
the crop will not be found profitable in a very 
Northern climate. 
In the Weetem country the oil is mostly man¬ 
ufactured by one or two wealthy companies who 
use powerful hydraulic presses, Two gallons 
per bushel is considered an excellent yield of 
oil. YV e think the Castor bean is worthy the 
attention of oar Western friends, as the prairies 
of the South-west are well adapted to it, and 
the demand for the oil is yearly increasing and 
becoming permanent. 
